not like me. I was starting to wonder if I needed to see a therapist. I took a deep breath, and then another. The awful guilt receded, but I knew it was at the edge of my mind, waiting for an opening to rush back in and smother me. What’s wrong with me? Is the pressure finally getting to me?
Even after I pushed away the terrible guilt, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. Taking the velvet box with the hair wreath out of my pocket didn’t ease my mind. Huguenin is a lonely road. Low brick walls lined the sides of the road, with cemeteries on either side. Although it was broad daylight, I felt a chill go down my back.
I blinked, and saw a man coming down the street toward me. He was walking down the middle of the road, and his posture raised a primal fear in me. Tall and raw-boned, the stranger held his hands away from his sides like a marshal in an Old West movie about to go into a gunfight. He wore jeans and a dark t-shirt with a collared shirt open over top. Something about the way he moved was all wrong. That’s when I realized I recognized him. Mr. Super-Handsome himself. Coffee Guy. And I did not think he had shown up here just to chat about a latte.
Unfortunately, there was nowhere to go and no one was in sight, except for Coffee Guy, who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. He was a little too perfect to be trusted. Maybe a little too perfect to be human.
Options? Not many. If this guy was faster than a human, he could probably be on me before I could get anywhere to call for help. There wasn’t a whole lot out here besides the cemeteries. Turning around wouldn’t work, since the road that intersected behind me was currently closed for water main repairs. No one had expected a traffic jam at the cemetery, or the need to outrun a renegade underwear model.
I kept the car moving, picking up speed to be a little more threatening. Coffee Guy kept walking right down the center of the street, and there was no mistaking the fact that his attention was completely on me. He looked like trouble, and not in an attractive kind of way.
He stared at me, head down but gaze lifted. It made me think of the way a wolf moves right before the kill. People talk about a smoldering gaze like something sexy, but I was pretty sure that the look in this guy’s eyes was more hellfire than attraction.
I gunned the gas a little, revving the engine and moving faster. Still, the stranger kept walking straight for me. I could run him down, but that could raise awkward questions if he turned out to be a real underwear model. Or, I could speed up and play a game of chicken, betting that he would jump out of my way. I didn’t think he looked sane enough to count on that. Option number three was to get to the cross-street before he did, and hope he didn’t have any tricks up his sleeve.
Coffee Guy just beat me to the cross-street when a car shot from the side street and hit him at full speed, tossing his body up in the air. For a horrible moment, I saw a young man fly limply from a terrible collision. And then, I saw something even more horrible. Coffee Guy twisted in mid-air like a gymnast from an impact that should have killed him. He landed in a crouch, and the illusion wavered.
My, what big teeth you have.
The magazine cover model was gone, and in his place was one butt-ugly monster. Big and muscular, with arms and legs too long to be human, the monster resembled a bloody skinned carcass. He was big enough that the dent in the car that hit him could have been from a deer or a moose. His head was oversized for the body, with a lantern jaw and sharp teeth, cat-slitted eyes that glowed red, and his infernal gaze was locked right on me.
I couldn’t see a driver in the car that had hit the creature, and I was hoping they had the good sense to get the hell out of there. The monster rushed toward me, and I had a choice to make. Ram him again with a car that was much smaller and lighter than the